Rachel, a scavenger in a destroyed city, finds a strange thing in the fur of a giant flying bear. She brings it home, and despite the misgivings of her partner, Wick, she names it Borne, keeps it, feeds it, and it grows and develops, and talks. It becomes her child, and like any child it must eventually grow beyond her and go out into the world, but she knows that her child, lovable and innocent and sweet, is a killer. Killing seems to be part of its fundamental nature. How can she love a killing thing? How can she let it loose on an already ravaged city? Can she even claim to have any control or authority over it?

With dangers closing in and driving them from their home, Rachel and Wick are forced on a journey to the heart of the Company that bred the giant flying bear, and who may or may not have bred Borne, but most of the secrets they eventually uncover are secrets about themselves.

A strange, powerful and evocative novel, of a strange kind of family somehow clinging together in a strange decaying world. Children in this are destructive: the bear's proxies, the feral orphans, Borne himself. Are they made that way by neglect or interference or inner natures or as a response to environment? Can they be helped or controlled or even survived? Can you forgive them for what they do? Can you forgive yourself? Can you help them? Can you help yourself? Can anyone fix a broken world?

A surreal story of surviving, and deciding to survive alone or together.